Puppet
by robbiepoo2341
Summary: (NOT WINCEST) Sam and Dean investigate a string of killers: visitors to a small town who go on killing sprees and drop dead when the sun comes up. The only thing the killers have in common? A toystore. But when Sam and Dean investigate the store, they don't come back out in the right bodies. (Note: Takes place during Season 3 before Dean goes to Hell.)
1. Chapter 1

A/N: One day, I'm going to get back to the real world, but this is too much fun. And this idea seized me, and I'm running with it.

Anyway, I don't know how often this will be updated. I'd like to keep on with my streak of updating every night, but with Christmas Break and my last semester of college coming up, we'll just have to wait and see. I've already got a couple chapters written, so that should give me a head start, right?

Also, don't laugh, but I got the idea for this particular villain from Teen Titans. I swear I made him creepier and I just took the basic ideas of his MO and his weaknesses, so it's not like a total crossover, but yeah. Just throwing that out there.

Anyway, on my last story, I was told I write like I'm writing episodes, so I'm running with that. Think of this first chapter as the cold open.

So, without any further ado, I present to you my second ever Supernatural fanfic!

Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or any related rights.

...

She was definitely lost.

This was a small town, and she had only been driving through by mistake. She missed her turn on the highway, took a wrong exit, and now she couldn't find her way back. It was the middle of the night, pouring freezing rain, but she didn't want to pull off anywhere to ask for directions. Everywhere looked closed, first of all, and besides that, she was a single woman, alone. Of course she was going to take precautions.

But now her tank was running low, and so were her options. There was one place with the lights still on, and she decided she would try it. It was brightly decorated, well, relatively speaking—all the paint in all the buildings looked about a hundred years old—and it sold children's toys, if she could read the signs right with the letters missing. That was probably a safe place to stop.

She pulled into the parking lot and put her keys between her fingers. Creepy backwoods towns at night? Yeah, she was definitely going to invest in a GPS once her next paycheck came in. She was only even traveling this late because her old roommate was getting married, gone off and eloped to Vegas, and she wanted to get there in time to get her a present before the honeymoon.

The present was neatly wrapped in her backseat, topped off with a bright blue bow and gold wrapping paper. She'd bought them a waffle iron, even though she was sure other people would get them appliances, but it was short notice, and she hadn't had time to think about a better gift.

She locked the car door behind her, then pulled her jacket collar up to try and cover her neck. The rain was coming down so hard now that it was practically blowing in sideways. By the time she reached the door, she was dripping wet, and she took a minute to wipe her shoes so she didn't slide on the tile floors before she looked for anyone at the counter.

No one was there. Of course. Just her luck. But the lights were on, so there should have been someone in the store somewhere. Maybe they were just in the back.

"Hello?" she called out. The air conditioning was on, and she shivered when the cold air hit her already soaking wet clothes. She pulled the jacket tighter over her shoulders, clutching as if it could keep out the wet and cold. But even though everything else was wet, her mouth felt dry. This place was creepy.

No one answered her calls, so she peeked around the corners of the aisles. Maybe they were shelving items? She could hear her heart beating in her ears, and she seriously thought about turning back. Maybe she wouldn't run out of gas. Or maybe she would and she'd just sleep in her car as close to the highway as she could get. This town was old and decrepit, and she was pretty sure this was the perfect breeding grounds for serial murderers.

She reached for the pepper spray in her purse. Good. Now she had pepper spray in one hand and keys between the fingers of the other hand. She was prepared for anything.

Finally, she made her way to the back of the store. She still couldn't see any employees, but what she did see scared her so badly that she almost dropped the can of pepper spray. (That was no good; she was going to have to keep a tighter grip on that if she wanted to stay alive. She couldn't go dropping her only good weapon at the first sign of trouble.)

The walls were lined with hundreds of puppets, dead little wooden things with too-realistic eyes. She peered closer at them, just to make sure they weren't going to jump out at her, then allowed herself a small laugh. She reached out to poke one of them. They were creepy, sure, but they were just toys.

"Hello?" she called out again, hoping that, now that she was closer to the back of the store, someone might hear her. Or maybe she was hoping that no one would hear her after all and she would finally have to turn around again.

"Oh, is someone there?" asked a high-pitched, nasally voice from the very back. Of course it was just past the aisle full of wooden puppets. "I'm sorry; I just stepped out back for a smoke. Can I help you?"

She tightened the jacket again, whether because she was cold from the air conditioning or because the puppets were creeping her out, she wasn't sure. "I think I'm lost," she called out to the disembodied voice, hoping it was a person and not a serial killer. "Can you help me get back to the highway?"

"Oh, sure thing! Give me just a second."

She waited in place, still clutching desperately at the coat that provided no protection. She glanced over at the puppets again and gasped. This time, she really did drop the pepper spray. She could have sworn she saw one of the puppets turn its head.

"Where are you?" she called out.

"Sorry, sorry," the voice answered. "I'm coming. Just let me . . . ." There was a crash of crates. The worker swore, then shouted again, "I'm so sorry! I'll get you back home, just let me . . . get through . . . ."

She was slowly backing out of the aisle now. The puppet eyes, in this lighting, seemed to follow her. "I'll just wait at the front counter," she said. At that, she turned to run, stooping first to pick up her pepper spray.

Thunder clapped, and the lights flickered, then died. The power was out.

The emergency light flickered on over her head, and she gave up all pretenses. She took off running down the aisle, not caring that she would look like an idiot if she had managed to creep herself out over nothing. She just wanted away from the moving eyes. Maybe it was the wind or the air conditioning, but she could swear she heard the clatter of wooden puppets against each other.

She tripped over something in the middle of the aisle and went sprawling. The pepper spray went again, this time under the shelves on the aisle next to her, but she wasn't going to stop and get it this time. She scrambled to try and get to her feet, then immediately fell back again when she looked up at the emergency light—standing under it, all on its own and holding the wooden controls and strings—was a flat-headed puppet with a pin-striped shirt and an evil grin.

She screamed out loud this time and scrambled backwards, temporarily forgetting about her legs and instead crawling. She managed to get to her feet and start running, but when she looked back, the puppet wasn't there anymore. Where did it go?

And then she felt a small hand grab her by the ankle, and she went sprawling. Her chin hit the ground, and she tasted blood, but she turned around swinging. The fist with her keys between the fingers connected with wood, and she heard the satisfying crunch of keys scraping out a pattern. The puppet released her, and she reached for the nearest thing she could use as a weapon—a big box with a Barbie Corvette inside.

But when she turned around, it was gone again. "Hello?" she shouted, hoping the employee in the back would hear her. "Can anyone help me? Are you there?"

The puppet was back on the next aisle, and this time it was glowing with some kind of weird yellow energy that settled in its too-human eyes.

She abandoned all her pretenses. "Help!" she shrieked. She started for the doors, but there was a short in them. Maybe it was the storm, maybe it was the puppet doing whatever weird magic crap it was doing, but they wouldn't open, and they were automatic.

She still had the keys between her fingers, and she tried to punch through the glass. She scratched it, but that wasn't as helpful as she would have liked.

And then the puppet held up the controls and the strings. It was grinning even wider now, with yellow, wooden teeth.

She felt her knees go weak, and then her whole body went limp.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Welcome to the end of the world! Here, have a chapter to read while you await imminent destruction.

Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural. All rights are retained by their rightful owners.

...

No one had ever seen this girl before, and the state police were at a loss to explain her motives for the killing spree.

They found her car parked in the toy store parking lot—where they found the first victim, the store employee, beaten to death with a blunt object, apparently wooden, since they found slivers in the man's forehead.

She broke into five local homes after that, slaughtering everyone she could find. The only survivor was a teenage daughter who had been staying in the guest room and barricaded herself inside. She swore up and down that the killer was sleepwalking, that the woman had her eyes closed the entire time and walked in short, jerky movements, like she was not fully in control of her limbs. But the police didn't listen to her; she was classified as an unreliable witness and treated for shock. No one could strangle twenty people in their sleep, especially not grown men, fathers, who were bigger than the woman.

But the strangest part was that, when the sun came up, she just crumpled to the ground, dead. There was no apparent cause of death, either, and the coroner ordered such a complete autopsy that it would have been impossible to miss anything. No heart attack, no tumors, nothing. She just stopped living all of a sudden, like all the life had gone out of her.

The newspapers (or what passed as papers in a place like this—they were really more like newsletters) reported it, of course; it was the biggest news their town had ever seen. But the police wanted to keep it quiet until they learned more.

" . . . and she had a wedding present for her best friend in the back of the car. It doesn't really strike me as serial killer behavior," Sam finished. He put down the newspaper clipping and looked over at his brother.

"Yeah, that and the fact that she dropped dead as soon as the sun came up. That seems like our kind of thing," Dean said. "Turn here?"

Sam glanced at the map underneath the newspaper he was holding. He nodded. "Yeah."

Dean turned off onto the dirt road, shaking his head. How anyone could get lost and find their way to this little podunk town was beyond him. (But then, he saw that the signs pointing to the interstate had been blown over, so it was a little more understandable, but still. How do you decide it's a good idea to drive through wooded hills in the middle of the night when a few more miles down the road you could find a good gas station and clear signs back to the highway?)

"It's not something we've seen before, Dean."

"You saying it's new?" Dean's entire face lit up. He'd been so sick of dealing with demons and plots and Hell and everything else lately that it would be nice to get some real adventure in there, a good mystery monster, a grateful girl . . . . Yeah, this was already shaping up to be a good case, and they hadn't even pulled out the FBI badges.

"Not sure," Sam said.

Dean just grinned even more. If Sammy was stumped, this was definitely worth a look.

They pulled into the local police station after driving for a good ten minutes. They'd already changed into the monkey suits on the way over, and Dean felt uncomfortable as usual. But the police looked even more displeased than he did; they had probably been hoping to keep this one in the local news and keep the feds out. That was usually the reaction they got, anyway.

A deputy who looked more like he was sixteen than thirty rushed up to greet them with freckles in his smile. "What brings you way out here, sirs?" he asked. He tried very hard to keep the accent out of his voice—he talked nice and slow so Dean could understand, but it was still there, hiding.

Sam held out his badge, and Dean followed suit. "We heard about the killings in this area," Sam said.

"Look, we've got it under control," the deputy said. "I don't see how it's a case for the—"

"Let 'em in," said the sheriff. He was standing in the doorway, holding some papers, and when he saw the Winchesters, he motioned them inside even before he interrupted his deputy.

The deputy looked like he wanted to argue, but he knew his place, and he wanted to keep his job. So he just waved Sam and Dean through, though Dean definitely caught the glare he was shooting their way.

The sheriff closed the door to his office behind them, and Sam started in with "We appreciate your helpfulness in this matter, sir—"

"Can it." The sheriff gave them both a hard look, eyeing their suits and their badges. Finally, he sat down at his desk and leaned forward. He grabbed a box of cigars and lit one up—he didn't offer the boys any. "You fellas looking into the killins?"

"Yes, sir," Sam said. He was doing that earnest face he always did when he wanted to seem like he was cooperating. Dean was just trying not to knock the guy's cigar out of his mouth. It smelled awful, like it had been made right there in the backwoods—which was not really out of the realm of possibilities.

"So y'all know it's not the first time this's happened?"

"No," Sam said. He leaned forward, right into the awful smoke. (Dean had to give his brother credit; he definitely had people skills down to an art.) "We had only heard about the girl."

The sheriff snorted. "'Course you have. Shows what sense you got, a couple of kids like you, just brought in from the turnip truck."

Dean felt like he should probably be offended, but he wasn't sure.

And then the sheriff slammed some files down. "Look, fellas, I'm letting you in on this not because I like you or nothin', but because every man I ever put on this case wound up dead or missin'. You put a stop to whatever's killin' my men, and I'll overlook the fact that you ain't FBI."

Dean and Sam both leaned forward, eyes wide. Sam even tried to talk their way out of it. "Of course we—"

"Uh-huh," the sheriff said. He didn't look convinced. He just shook his head. "We ain't had visitors from outside much, but I been 'round the beltway a couple 'o times. Can't fool an old man, boys. Suit's too new, and you ain't got the stuffy procedural air." Then, he laughed. "And don't go pulling a '67 Impala into my place and say you got it at the Bureau. I been raised by a mechanic my whole life and I ain't never seen a fed drive nothin' that classic. All wrapped up in the 'lectric cars."

Dean couldn't help but grin. That was his baby. "She's my dad's car," he said.

"Uh-huh," the sheriff said again. "I saw some action in my day. So don't think you can pull the wool over my eyes."

"We wouldn't dream of it," Sam said a little too quickly.

"Look, you boys look into this and come out alive, I ain't gonna tell nobody. You two die out there, damage is done, I say."

"That's very big of you, sir," Dean said quickly; he could tell Sam was getting ready to say something else, but he was just glad to get out of there while they could. There was Agent Hendrickson to consider, not to mention the time Dean would lose with Sam if they got help up there. He scooped up the files and excused himself and his brother before the sheriff could change his mind.

They were in the Impala in a matter of minutes, and Sam was examining the badges with a frown. "I don't get it," he said. "These usually work."

"Yeah, well, figures it'd be a redneck to bust us," Dean muttered. He threw the badges in the backseat. "It's a good thing whatever this is had him too scared to turn us in."

"Yeah, let's not push our luck."

They checked into the only motel in town—and, since they didn't get many visitors, it looked and smelled like something had died in it. Something probably had, come to think of it. Dean wrinkled his nose, and Sam just shook his head. They threw their bags down, and Dean pulled out some of the takeout they'd grabbed on the way over. At least it helped the smell.

Sam unpacked his stuff, watching Dean like he might explode. He'd been like that ever since Christmas, watching Dean's every move and trying to decide if he was going to die early. Dean knew time was running out, but Sam was going to extremes.

But Sam finished hanging up his clothes, put his stuff in drawers, all the usual routine. Dean took off his shoes and sat on the bed with his food. He'd unpack when he got around to it, and besides, he was hungry. He hadn't been able to eat much on the road over because the roads were twisty and bumpy, and he'd needed both hands on the steering wheel. Sam, on the other hand, had finished off all of his dinner and even a little of Deans. (The kid could eat everything—he was like a walking garbage disposal.)

Besides, Dean didn't usually unpack until at least the second day. If he was lucky, the case would only take them the better part of a day, and then he could just leave his stuff in the trunk. No use going to all that trouble, right?

Sam sat down at the table and started looking through the old case files the sheriff had given them. His frown deepened the more he looked at them. "This is weird," he said out loud.

"What's weird?"

"All the cases seem to be the same. Someone from outside the community shows up, and during the night, they go on killing sprees. They all die the next morning, and no one knows why."

"How often?"

"As often as they get lost tourists, which isn't very much," Sam said. "Maybe every few years? Not often enough to rouse any suspicions." He looked around at the paint falling off their walls. "From the looks of things, I don't think they get visitors often enough to raise eyebrows."

"Guess it makes the locals a little wary of outsiders, though," Dean said, thinking of the kid-deputy who tried to keep them out.

"Well, can you blame them? It's not like this place has a great track record with tourists."

"True," Dean admitted. He brought his food with him to look over Sam's shoulder at the police records. He made a face at the bloody crime scene photos, then frowned when he realized what they all had in common.

"Start at the toy store first?" Sam asked. He had seen it, too: the pictures that all started in the same place. "That's where all the killers hit first."

"Sure," Dean said through a mouthful of Chinese. Then, a thought occurred to him: "What was she doing pulled in there, anyway? All the other places she hit were homes with lots of money. I figure a run-down store in a place like this doesn't have much in the cash box."

Sam nodded his agreement, and they were out of the smelly motel room as soon as Dean shoveled the last of his food into his mouth. (Now the place smelled like orange chicken, but that was a better smell than mold and death any day.)

Dean grabbed a car air freshener from the front desk of the motel on his way out the door—not for the Impala, of course, but for their room. Things like that didn't really bother him, but the place was practically curling Sam's hair, and he didn't want the people they interviewed thinking Sam was any more of a girl than they usually did.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: I forgot to mention that this story takes place during Season 3, BEFORE Dean goes to Hell.

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural. All rights are retained by their proper owners.

...

The toy store looked creepy even during the day, so it must have been worse at night. Sam didn't imagine the girl who stopped here had felt she had many options. The news reports said it was one of the few stores still open that time of night, but even with the lights, she must have been desperate.

"Do you have any security cameras?" Sam asked the owner, a mousy little woman with big glasses and grey hair that never stayed tucked behind her ears all the way.

"Oh, no," she said. She smiled wide enough to show all four teeth. "I ain't never learned how to operate them fancy cameras. Never needed to before."

"Even when so many of your employees have been murdered?" Sam asked.

The old woman looked up at him with wide eyes. "That weren't nobody's fault. Outsiders like you come in and go poking their noses in where they don't belong."

"And go postal?" Dean poked his head in through the door, smiling like he always did. He went right up to Sam. "Checked out the car. You were right—the present was in the backseat, but her car was practically out of gas. Running on fumes. She probably stopped here to get directions before she broke down on some backwoods road."

Sam nodded, then turned back to Dean. "Do you mind if we take a look around the place?"

She held out her hands. "You go right ahead. And if you see anything you like, I give discounts for law enforcement."

Sam assured her that he would definitely let her know before he followed Dean down the aisles. There was some crime scene tape down the first aisle, and Dean crouched down to look at something.

"What is it?"

"Bits of wood, I think," Dean said. He picked them up. "Like someone was carving."

"Carving?"

Dean nodded.

Sam frowned. "Huh. That's weird."

They combed the rest of the toy shop, but they didn't see anything else interesting. Well, besides the stain on the floor where the toy store employee was crushed underneath some boxes in the back. (They were going to talk to the kid's parents eventually; it was on their list of stops to make in their investigation.) For a crime scene, it was surprisingly clean. Most of their cases were a lot messier than this.

Okay, so this was going to be a bit harder than they expected. No big deal.

They excused themselves from the toy store and climbed into the Impala. Dean started the engine, then turned to Sam. "So, what do you think?"

"I think it looks like she pulled in to get out of the storm and get directions," Sam said.

Dean nodded. "Normal girl gets lost in the woods and finds a store with its lights on. Sounds about right." He backed out of the parking lot and winced at the grinding sound beneath his tires as all the gravel beat at the bottom of his baby.

"Something must have crawled inside her and taken control," Sam continued. "But something went wrong. I've never heard of a possession that only lasted the night."

"Maybe it's not a demon," Dean said, and Sam pretended he couldn't hear the hopefulness in his brother's voice.

And Sam understood. Of course he did. His brother was terrified—of demons, of Hell, of everything they'd been through. And he didn't like being scared, being weak in front of his brother. He didn't like the idea that Sam could see him vulnerable, because, for some reason, Dean was convinced that it was his job to keep Sam safe. But Sam's job was to take care of Dean, too, whether Dean admitted it or not, and so he was starting to take notice of these things—thing like how Dean tensed up when it was a demon case, like how his brother didn't sleep so well, not since Christmas. They'd passed a mile marker in their year together, and it was hard to ignore.

"It might be something different," Sam agreed, more to placate his brother than anything else. "Ghosts can possess people, too."

"Doesn't seem like a ghost," Dean said. "I couldn't get any EMF readings, and I didn't see any ectoplasm."

"Just wood shavings," Sam said.

"Yep." Dean frowned as they turned down the next dirt road. The houses and buildings were so far apart from each other; it was no wonder whatever this was had only had time to get to five of them.

The first stop on their list was the house where the teenage daughter had survived the attack. The police had already questioned her about what happened, and the Winchesters knew from sad experience that most witnesses weren't as cooperative the second time around.

"Better turn up the charm, Sammy," Dean said. He liked to tease Sam about The Look, but lately he had been saying that The Look might keep him out of tight scrapes when he was gone. He'd stopped dissing the puppy dog eyes.

"Shut up." Sam rolled his eyes.

They pulled into the driveway, where the girl was sitting outside her house, wrapped in her jacket, waiting for the police to finish looking through her house, which was now technically a crime scene. She saw the Impala drive up and tensed; the Winchesters were outsiders, after all, and she hadn't had good experience with outsiders.

"Excuse me; are you Claire?"

The girl looked up at Dean with sunken eyes. She could hardly have been fourteen, and she looked like she hadn't eaten or slept since the incident. Sam watched as his brother transformed into a different Dean entirely, the Dean that was good with kids.

"Hey, you look awful," Dean said. He fished around in his pockets until he found it: the granola bar he'd shoved in his jacket on the way out the door. He offered it to her.

The girl stared out the granola bar for a while, her nose wrinkled with indecision. "Ain't supposed to take food from strange men," she said at last. "Learned that one back when I was in diapers. I ain't stupid."

Dean laughed and plopped himself down on the curb beside her. "Don't worry about that, Claire. We're from the FBI." He whipped out his badge to show her. "We're here to make sure that what happened to your family never happens to anyone else."

Claire frowned, but at last, she took the food and bit off a bit—just a small bite, like she was checking to make sure it wasn't poisoned. But once she decided the food was good, she devoured the whole thing in a matter of seconds. She even gave Dean a little, shy smile.

"There ya' go," Dean grinned at her. "Now, I know you probably don't want to be talking about what happened so soon, but my partner and I want to know everything you saw."

The girl looked so much younger than fourteen when she looked up at Sam. She frowned at him, and Sam tried to give her his best encouraging smile, but he had never been as good with kids as Dean was. Maybe it was a big brother thing. Even The Look didn't work for him and kids like Dean's natural talents did.

"He's okay. He's just freakishly tall," Dean said with a shrug.

This made Claire smile, and she seemed to relax a bit more. "I already told the police what I saw," she said in a small voice.

"And you did a great job. I read what you said in the report, and that's what brought us here," Dean said. He dug around in his pockets for more food, but all he came up with was a half-finished bag of Skittles. He offered it to her, and she held out her hand for him to pour them in.

"You want me to tell it again?" she asked uneasily.

Dean just nodded. He was still smiling, and Sam didn't dare interfere. This was the most relaxed he had seen Dean in a long time.

"I don't really know how it started," she said. She popped another Skittle in her mouth. "I just know that I could hear moaning outside the door, and then she busted through it like it was made of glass!"

Sam frowned. He'd seen the autopsy report on this girl; she definitely wasn't big enough to bust down a wooden door.

"And then she went right for my parents," Claire said. She hiccoughed and sniffed. "She kept her arms raised like the zombies do in movies, you know? And when she was finished with them . . . ." She paused and sniffed again.

"But you hid in your room so she couldn't find you?" Dean supplied.

Claire nodded. "I don't think she knew I was home. I was supposed to be out with my boyfriend last night, but we had a big fight and . . . ." She hiccoughed again.

"Did you see anything else?" Dean asked, trying to steer her back to the conversation.

Claire looked up at him with big, wet eyes. "I already told you everything that happened."

"Yes, and it was very helpful," Dean said. "But tell me more about the girl that did this. What did she look like?"

"She looked like a girl," Claire said with a shrug. "I mean, she had long hair in a ponytail, and she was wearing nice jeans like y'all city folk wear." She frowned, thinking harder now. "I don't know. I guess she moved weird."

"Weird how?" Sam asked.

Claire looked up at Sam like she had just remembered Sam was there. But then she turned her attention back to Dean. "Like she was stiff, like a doll. When she . . . when she killed my ma and pa . . . ."

Dean patted her on the back. "It's okay, Claire."

She sniffed. "I'm okay," she whispered at last. She tried to sit up straighter, to act older than she really was. "When she killed my ma and pa, she only moved her arms at the elbows and wrists, like a doll does, you know?"

Sam frowned. That definitely wasn't something they had come across before.

"Anything else you can tell us?" Dean prompted.

Claire shook her head. "I don't think so."

"Anything at all," Dean pressed. "No matter how crazy it sounds."

Claire tilted her head at Dean. Finally, she bit her lip and stared at the ground. "Well, there was this one thing."

"Yeah?"

"There was this . . . this thing in the doorway."

"What did it look like?" Dean asked.

Claire shook her head. "It was dark, and it was hard to tell. But the storm was really loud, and it blew the whatever it was around. It sounded like those wood wind chimes that y'all hang up near harvest season?"

Dean nodded. "So you think she brought something wooden along with her?" He looked up at Sam, and the understanding passed between them. The wood shavings at the toy store—they were related somehow to whatever was going on here.

"It looked like a very little person," Claire continued. Now that she had started, it was hard to get her to stop. "But he had—oh, it was an awful face!" With that, she actually grabbed a fistful of Dean's jacket and buried her face in his side.

Dean was so surprised by the move that he didn't even react with the usual half-hearted pat. He just stared at her until the outburst was over, then collected his wits enough to pat her back after she pulled away. "Look," he said awkwardly, "if you need anything—or if you remember anything else that might help us—just let me know, okay?" He reached into his jacket and pulled out their FBI card, the one with one of his cell phone numbers on it.

Claire stared at the card for a long time before, at last, she said, "I ain't got a phone. You ain't gonna get much reception out here, neither."

Dean shrugged. "Well, we'll be staying at the motel. You can leave a message for us there if you like."

Claire nodded. Then, slowly, she asked, "Are you going to catch whoever did this? Sheriff says ain't nobody caught them before."

Dean had been about to get up, but he paused instead and turned towards her with such a look of earnestness on his face that even Sam had to stop. "That's our job, Claire," Dean said. "I promise, we'll keep you safe, okay?"

Claire smiled. "Okay."


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: This one's a little shorter than the others, sorry. But it gets the action started! :)

Disclaimer: I don't own any rights related to Supernatural. All rights are retained by their rightful owners.

...

Dean had almost finished picking the lock on the back door to the toy store. They had decided to take a look around while no one was home, just to be sure there were no more casualties or accidental deaths while they were investigating—employees tended to die when people came to visit their store at night. Much more of this, and that old lady with four teeth was never going to find anyone to work the counter. People were already starting to say this place was cursed—most of the kids Dean talked to were convinced that taking a job here was a straight ticket to an early grave. (The kid who worked here the other night was cash-strapped, though, and saving up to propose to his girl.)

It was their only lead, though, and Dean was hoping they could find more at night than they could during the day; it was their best shot. After all, most of the deaths happened at night, and the sun coming up seemed to take away whatever power this thing had.

The door opened with a creak, and Dean winced. He hoped the old lady hadn't heard that; rumor was she slept in a loft above this place, and Dean thought she definitely looked the type. He didn't want to have to explain himself to an old lady with a shotgun. (This whole town was filled with rednecks and rifles.)

But he didn't hear anyone coming down the stairs, so he pushed the door open a little further and motioned for Sam to follow him in. They kept their flashlights out, wandering the aisles.

"Look for wooden things first?" Sam suggested. "Anything that could have left behind the carving leftovers."

Dean frowned. A lot of these toys were old-fashioned. Wooden rocking horses, tin soldiers, the stuff out of old Christmas movies or Hallmark specials. "Dude," he said, emphatically gesturing at the carved toys on the third aisle. Sam just shrugged, and Dean rolled his eyes.

"Split up?" Sam asked. Dean was trying to let Sam call the shots on more missions, and he'd told Sam to take point on this investigation, since Dean wouldn't be around much longer to help.

Dean frowned again. He didn't like that idea, but he knew they would cover more ground. "Don't get lost," he told Sam—his way of reminding his kid brother not to get himself in more trouble than he usually did. "I'll start at the back and meet you in the middle."

Sam nodded, and Dean took off with his flashlight.

But once he got to the back, he immediately wished he hadn't picked this spot. The whole aisle was lined with wooden puppets, with eyes that looked almost human. He took a minute to compose himself. "Jeez," he whispered. He forced himself forward. "Nothing creepy about this, no sir," he muttered to himself.

He heard something clatter behind him and spun around, his gun raised. But no, there was nothing there. He frowned and kept his hand on the trigger; in his experience, unexplained noises were usually at the root of the problem.

He kept his eyes on the place the noise seemed to be coming from, his gun trained carefully. Slowly, carefully, he kept backing down the aisle. He backed right into one of the shelves and knocked a couple puppets over. He clicked his tongue in annoyance, then bent down to put them back—and stopped.

He held the puppet in his hands for just a second longer, then tucked it under his arm and made a dash for it. He ignored the fact that it looked like all the puppets turned to stare at him; he had to find Sammy.

He ran into his giant of a brother down the fourth aisle—literally. They collided, and Dean dropped the puppet he was holding. He reached down to scoop it up again while Sam called him names that Dean was proud to have taught that saint. "What'd you do that for?" Sam asked.

Dean just held up the puppet. "Dude," he said. "Who does this look like?"

Sam stared at it for a while, frowned, but then the recognition crossed his face. His frown deepened, and he reached into his pocket for the picture of their mystery killer. He unfolded it and held it up next to the puppet for comparison.

"Weird," Sam said.

The puppet looked exactly like their mystery girl, right down to the ponytail, the freckles, the clothes, and the mole underneath her chin. "I thought these people said they had never seen our killer before," Dean said.

"She just pulled off the side of the road for directions, Dean. She'd never been here before." Sam just kept shaking his head. This was weird, even for them. It wasn't like a voodoo doll, either—it was a full on puppet.

"This was hand-carved," Dean pointed out.

"Which probably explains the wood carvings," Sam said. He kept staring at the puppet and then back at the picture like he couldn't quite wrap his brain around it.

"So," Dean said slowly, "this thing takes over a person and makes them into a puppet—like, a real puppet, not just a meat puppet like the demons do." He frowned. "I don't think I've heard of a monster like that before."

"Me neither," Sam said. He tucked the picture back into his pocket.

"Feels like some serious hoodoo to me," Dean muttered. He put the puppet down on the nearest shelf and eyed it carefully while he reached for his pistol.

"No spell I've ever heard of, though," Sam said.

Dean slapped his brother on the back. "Well, sounds like we need some more research. That's your thing, right?" (Sam just glared at him.) He turned back for the puppet, intending to put it back, but it was gone.

Dean could already feel his body tensing, ready for the fight, when he turned to his brother. "Dude," he said. "Where's the puppet go?"

Sam turned to the shelf, and his eyes widened. He crouched down. "Maybe it fell over?"

Dean shook his head. Something had taken the puppet—or maybe it had walked away on its own. He could feel the cigarette lighter in his jacket pocket; it was a reliable defense against wooden things and would probably be a better defense against wooden toys than bullets.

The whole place got suddenly colder, and the emergency light in the back of the store flickered with the familiar whine of interrupted electricity. But still the EMF was not making a sound; it just sat in Dean's pocket, taking up valuable space—so it wasn't a ghost. When they came back, Dean was going to bring lighter fluid and matches instead of rock salt and holy water. (And what were they supposed to think? Peoples' bodies being hijacked? It was very ghost or demon behavior.)

Dean was just about to suggest that they book it out of there and come back when they had a better idea of what they were fighting when he heard a sound that stopped him cold: the clattering of wood against wood, like old wind chimes.

He saw something scuttling down on the floor, and he fired at it, not really caring that he would probably wake up the old lady. If she was the one working her hoodoo, he didn't much care about her beauty sleep. (They were definitely going to have a long talk with her when all this was over.)

Whatever it was scuttled away, and he could hear Sam beside him, but he did not tear his eyes away from his end of the aisle.

He felt a little hand on his ankle, and for how small the hand was, he was surprised at the strength that went into flipping him on his back. He grunted when his head hit the floor, and when it lolled to one side, he saw it: the face grinning back at him with very human eyes.

He had only seen it for a second before it disappeared, but he knew now what the wood was on the floor—the puppet had claw marks down his face. There had been bits of wood in the keys they found on their mystery killer, and he was willing to bet she'd fought this very puppet.

And she'd done a much better job fending it off, apparently. Dean struggled to get back to his feet—with Sam's help—but then there was more scuttling around them. The thing wouldn't stay still long enough for Dean to get a decent shot at it.

"Maybe we should come back during regular visiting hours?" Sam asked.

"Shut up, Sam." Dean was trying to spot the puppet through the cracks in between the shelves on the aisle. He was looked down at a kid's eye level, but he hadn't looked up at the top shelves.

_Bam_. There was a child-size puppet sitting on Sam's chest, and Sam had fallen with such force that he knocked Dean over, too.

Dean's head hurt. He'd run into one of those steel shelves, and he was seeing stars. But he forced himself to his feet. There was an evil puppet on his brother; he could think about his head later. He could feel warm blood dripping down his neck, but he'd get that fixed later.

He grabbed the thing by its strings—strings that it was holding in its hand, but not all of the strings. With a rough tug, he managed to get it off Sam, then offered his brother a hand off. "Dude, you got taken down by a kid's toy."

"Shut up."

They heard the clattering around the corner again, but this time Dean was prepared. He reached into his pocket for his lighter and kept the flame close. "Come and get it," he muttered under his breath.

The thing must have heard him. It popped around the corner, and Dean took a shot at it. The shot missed—that little puppet was faster than Dean had expected—and now there was some weird magic going down. The wooden controls that held its strings were glowing yellow, and Dean could feel something inside him being drawn to that glow.

He blinked, shaking his head, trying not to give in.

He heard Sam fall to the ground with a thunderous crash—the kid was too big to do anything quietly—and Dean knew this was his last chance. He felt the life going out of him, and he threw his lighter, hoping it would hit the puppet and torch the sucker—and he fired one last shot at the control thingy before he passed out.


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Okay, I'm taking a quick break. I'll come back with Chapter 6 the day after Christmas, but I refuse to do anything resembling work on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day :P

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural at all.

...

When Sam opened his eyes, the puppet was dancing in place, trying to put out the fire that was burning away at the corner of his controls. Good. He was distracted.

Sam gasped when he tried to sit up; his head was throbbing. He brought his hand up to the back of his head and winced when he felt warm blood. He must have hit his head when he fell over.

The lights went out when the puppet managed to get the fire out, and he could only see dark shapes now. He could see his brother struggling to get up, and he pulled himself to his own feet. Everything seemed a little bigger, or maybe that was just because his vision was swimming. He felt unsteady on his feet.

Dean seemed heavier than usual as Sam slipped his arm underneath his brother's shoulders. But somehow, they made it out of the store. Sam didn't dare look back; his vision was swimming and Dean wasn't fully conscious yet, so he knew they didn't have the juice to take on that puppet right then.

It was a moonless night, so he still couldn't see very well, but his brother was starting to stir. He heard Dean groan, then felt his shoulders get lighter. Now Dean was running on his own, without Sam's help, and they made it to the Impala.

Dean jumped in the front seat—or, at least, he tried to. Sam ducked like he usually did, but Dean must have forgotten—not that he had ever needed to before, but he must have misjudged the distance. His head slammed into the top of the car, and he swore as he stumbled backwards and squeezed himself inside. Sam looked over to tease his brother—and stopped cold.

"Dean?"

It was like looking in a mirror. The guy in Sam's body brought his hands up to his face, massaging his cheeks. "Sammy?"

Sam frowned. How was this even possible?

Dean, in Sam's body—boy, that was going to get confusing—examined himself. He scooted the seat back so he could work with his longer legs, then adjusted the mirror some more. "Dude, I'm a giant," Dean said. He tried to smile, but Sam's face didn't make the exact smile Dean wanted.

Really? That's what Dean was going with? Sam shook his head, then winced.

Dean slowed down; they were close enough to the motel and far enough away from the toy store that he was comfortable ending the temporary retreat. He pulled over to lean Sam's head forward and examine in. He sucked air in through his teeth. "I forgot about that," he muttered.

"Forgot about it?" Sam frowned. "Dean, your head—my head—is pounding!"

Dean shrugged like it didn't matter.

"We'll get you patched up, Sammy. Don't you worry. And then we'll get you out of that beat-up old thing and into your Sasquatch meat suit, gotcha?"

Sam nodded. He winced as Dean rolled up his jacket—Sam's jacket—and placed it behind Sam's head. Sam put his hand there and pressed the jacket against the bleeding area. He mentally cursed Dean for not taking better care of himself. He felt tired and old and worn, and that was all Dean's doing. This was nothing like the exhaustion he usually felt; this was more.

They made it back to the hotel, where Dean took a look at the back of Sam's—Dean's—head. He tutted. "Sammy, you gotta take better care of yourself."

"You're gonna turn this back on _me_?" Sam would have shaken his head, but it hurt too much, so he just settled for the old-fashioned eye roll.

Dean shrugged and lumbered over to the fridge to get some beer—their substitute for rubbing alcohol these days. He already had out the floss and sewing needle. He bent down at the fridge and hit his head.

"Sorry, Sammy," he said, rubbing his forehead as he handed Sam the beer. "I'll try and take better care of your body while I'm in it."

Sam frowned. It was Dean's total disregard for his own health that got him in his current situation in the first place, and now he was only taking care of himself because he was Sam now.

An idea started to form at the back of Sam's mind at that thought, but he didn't say anything out loud, at least not until he had time to think about it. And maybe he wouldn't tell Dean about it at all, either.

Dean finished tying up the back of his own head, then sighed as he sank into the chair by the table. He propped his feet up on the table, though it took him a little longer to do it because he misjudged the distance the first time. He reached behind him to run his hand through all of Sam's hair and frowned. "Dude. I always knew you were a chick. Why is your hair super conditioned?"

Sam tried not to blush. He wasn't going to tell Dean about how Jess liked to run her hands through Sam's hair, about how she had encouraged him to grow it out and he just wasn't ready to give up that habit just yet. So, he chose not to rise to the bait and instead countered with something of his own: "Why aren't you taking better care of yourself?"

Dean shrugged. "Why watch what you eat and worry about my body when I'm going to be gone soon?" Realization crossed his face, and Sam knew he'd understood what Sam had already known as soon as he saw his own face staring back at him.

"Dean . . . ." Sam tried to warn him off the subject with just his tone of voice, but Dean was already standing.

"We've got to find someone to tell," he said. He was pacing, unconsciously tugging at Sam's long hair. "We gotta make sure they get the right one of us. I'm not letting you die again after everything I did to—"

"Dean," Sam said, louder this time. He pointed.

Dean yelped and jumped back, stumbling a bit when his too-long legs tangled up in the chair. There was the puppet, its child-like face pressed up against the window, its evil smile plastered against the glass.

Dean reached for his extra lighters in his pockets, then realized he was wearing Sam's clothes. He opened the kitchen drawers for some matches while the puppet pounded against the window. There was salt along the windowsill, but still the puppet was coming in.

"How do we kill this thing?" Sam asked.

"And do you think it can turn us back?" Dean asked.

Sam tried to give his brother The Look, but it was much harder to do without his usual facial features. This was not the time to be worrying about that; now was the time to worry about keeping their current bodies so they didn't die when the sun came up.

Dean got that, though. And he dived right back into action. He grabbed some matches and held them up threateningly in front of the window. The puppet glared at him, then, slowly, backed away from the window.

"Doesn't want to mess with us again," Dean muttered, grinning. "Learned his lesson the first time."

"He'll be back, though," Sam pointed out.

Dean made a face—which was weird, since the faces he usually made didn't go as well with Sam's facial muscles as with his own. "Ugh. Sounds like we're taking shifts."

Sam shrugged. "I'll take the first shift."

Dean opened his mouth like he was going to insist that he should take the first shift, but Sam saw him pause. He could practically see the wheels in his brother's head turning. If he was in Sam's body now, that meant he was going to have to start taking care of that body until Sam was safely back inside. Which meant he was going to have to do things like sleep and eat properly. Sam could already see the annoyance building on what used to be his own face. Dean was going to have to rethink all his habits.

Sam waited until he was sure Dean was asleep before he cracked open the laptop. He kept half an eye on the windows and doors, of course, and the puppet reared its ugly head once or twice, but Sam chased it off with a lighter and some alcohol. But he was more interested in, first of all, figuring out what this thing was and, second of all, how to stop it without switching their bodies back.

Sam had every intention of keeping Dean's body. He had been trying to find a way to get his brother out of this day since the day Dean made it, and here was a solution sitting in his lap. They could have Sam—disguised as Dean—and then Sam would go in his brother's place, like he was supposed to. Sam was supposed to be dead, anyway, and Dean had upset the balance of things.

Hypocrite. Sam wanted to hit Dean sometimes. He remembered how Dean had reacted when he learned about their dad's deal, and now Dean expected Sam to take _his _news calmly?

He wouldn't tell Dean, though. He'd act like he wanted back in his body, but he was good at research, and if anyone could find a way to keep the body switching _and _kill the monster, it was Sam Winchester.

It was weird typing on his laptop, though. He had a typing speed of ninety words per minute, give or take, but Dean's fingers were a little stumpier than Sam's, and his hands were differently shaped. His hands had to relearn where to go for all the keys, and it was slowing him down—not to mention the clicking keys were disrupting Dean's sleep.

Sam had never seen Dean sleep like that before. He was always tensed and ready for anything. But Sam's body didn't work like that. Sam had never had to worry like Dean had, had never stayed up late taking care of Dean when he was sick. Sam was starting to regret that he had never done any of those things; he could see it even in the way Dean moved. This wasn't Dean anymore; it was some weird cross between the two of them. Maybe Dean as he would have been if they'd been born into a different family.

On the other hand, Sam could feel Dean's body tensing up every time he moved, could feel his heart racing at the slightest noise. His senses were constantly on alert; it was no wonder Dean felt like all he could do was hunt. He'd been turned into the perfect machine through pure force of habit. Sam could feel his body settling in for another night without sleep.

So when Dean's cell phone bleeped out an alarm and Dean slapped Sam's lanky arms into the snooze button, it took a long time for Sam to get his body calm enough to actually go to sleep. He'd never had that problem before. He could always just drift off, secure in the knowledge that his brother had his back. But this . . . intensity that ran through Dean's body was going to kill him if he wasn't careful.

Sam was going to talk to Dean about heart-healthy foods when this was all over. Because Dean was going to get through this year—and the next, and the next. They'd find a way, and then Sam was going to _make _Dean take better care of himself.

Sam hadn't realized how bad it was before. But now he was actually living Dean's total disregard for his own health and safety. He couldn't decide if he was more upset at Dean, Dad, or himself for getting Dean to this point, either.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: I'm back! And it was quite a lovely Christmas, too. Anyway, no promises on how often I'll be updating this thing. I've got a publisher I'm looking at submitting to for some real world books, so that's important. That and I've got a sinus infection and they gave me this medicine and HOLY COW I'm either wide awake and doing five things at once or else I'm dead asleep and it's weird.

Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Supernatural or any of the related rights.

...

When Dean got back to his own body, he'd bash Sam's face in. Might make shaving the thing easier.

Dean frowned at the reflection in the mirror, weirded out not only by the fact that it was not his own but by the fact that Sam wanted it to stay that way.

"Maybe it'll confuse the hell hounds long enough—"

"For what? For both of us to get killed?" Dean had been upset then, but now, staring at Sam's face in the mirror instead of his own, it just seemed more real. His mistake was going to get Sammy killed all over again. His fault.

He was supposed to take care of Sammy, and he failed. He failed so completely.

But they made it through the night, and the puppet never got in. By the time the sun came up, he could see the stress liens forming on Sam's face—his face. He recognized that look from nights in front of the mirror, but Sam just kept right on letting him sleep. He should have been resting—he had a gaping head wound, after all.

Sam had argued, of course. Dean always took the longer shifts for himself, and now that he was Dean, he should be able to handle it, right?

Didn't count. Just cuz Sam looked like him didn't mean he was actually the big brother.

"Let's check out the toy store again," Dean said when he got out of the bathroom. He had nicked himself shaving a couple times, but Sam's face was longer than he was used to.

"Have a chat with the owner?" Sam nodded. "Sounds good to me."

It was different getting in the Impala. Sam was way taller. Dean had always teased him about it, called him Sasquatch and Gargantuan. But suddenly there were little things to worry about. Like doorways. And ducking to get into the Impala. How did Sam even get around? And how did he buy shoes for those massive feet?

"Dude," Dean muttered. "It's like being the Jolly Green Giant."

"Just because you're so short," Sam muttered. But Dean could tell his brother was having trouble. He could tell Sam didn't feel comfortable in Dean's body, and it was the first time he regretted going so many nights with no sleep, eating just burgers and fries, taking the hard shots. He was used to feeling creaky even at the ripe young age of twenty-nine—but Sam?

"You doing okay?" Dean asked.

"Just tired, you know? What have you been doing in here?" Sam shrugged his jacket up a little higher, then winced. Dean had forgotten all about the dislocated shoulder he had popped back into place on their most recent hunt. It didn't bother him anymore, but he didn't baby himself like he babied Sam. Dean had always been there to ice the bruises, to stitch the cuts, to make sure Sam was okay.

"Oh, you know, just the usual stuff. I wasn't expecting you to jump in my bones, and besides, if I'm burnin' up in a few months, why bother with the pedicures, you know?" Dean tried to wave it off, but he knew he and Sam were going to be talking about this for some time. Sam wasn't going to let this one die; he seemed to think he still had a chance of getting Dean out alive. He kept making Dean plan for the future like he still had one.

Sam just looked sad. Was that how his face looked when he was sad? It was weird. He wasn't used to seeing himself with a puppy dog face.

They climbed out of the Impala together, and the old woman greeted them at the door. "You've come back? Find something that interests you?" she asked.

Sam nodded. "Those puppets in the back—did you make them?"

The old woman frowned. "Oh, you don't want those. Those are old. Been around since my mother was running the place." She shook her head. "Maybe I can interest you in something else?" She looked them over. "I'm thinking something antique?"

Dean recognized the insinuation and would have batted it down, but he was trying to stay on this woman's good side, and he didn't know what button to push inside Sam to turn on the Sammy Charm. "How old are those puppets, then? They definitely seemed antique."

"Why are you so interested in them?"

"Don't you know?"

The old woman frowned. "I . . . I don't think . . . ."

Dean lost his patience. The one nice thing about a huge Sammy body was the extra strength and swing when he grabbed someone by the scuff of her neck and slammed her up against the wall—though carefully, because her bones were brittle. "Look, lady," he said, but Sam's voice wasn't as deep and frightening as Dean could make his. "I'm not in the mood to play games."

"Agents?"

Dean spun around when he heard the small voice behind him. He dropped the old lady when he saw the look on Claire's face. "Claire," he said.

Claire looked at both of them—but she looked longer at Sam. Of course, she thought it was Dean in there, but Sam didn't know how to respond to her. "What's going on?"

Sam realized Claire was looking to him for comfort and explanation, and he cleared his throat. "Forgive my brother. We've been through a lot, and he's—"

"Your brother?"

"Yeah."

"You work together?"

"Yeah."

Claire wrinkled her nose. "You two aren't very much alike," she said at last.

"Yeah. He's the better-looking one," Dean said with a grin. At least there were some good things that could come of this body-switching thing.

Claire tilted her head at him. He could see the wheels turning in her head. Why was the Sasquatch the one who seemed so comfortable with her when it was the other way around before?

"What are you doing here, anyway?" Sam asked.

Claire thrust her jaw forward and straightened her shoulders. "I know I don't look it, and I know I was a mess when you came to see me, but I can take care of myself. I know y'all think I'm just some backwoods bumpkin, but I run my school's newspaper, and I'm gonna be a reporter when I graduate high school."

"Oh, you are?" Dean was trying his best not to laugh. "Regular little Nancy Drew, huh?"

Sam gave him the look he usually gave when Dean made a reference that surprised his brother. What? Like he hadn't been paying attention to what the girls his age were reading in elementary school. He liked the Hardy Boys, personally, but then they were about crime-solving brothers, so he was bound to have a soft spot.

Claire glared at him. "Look, agent, I don't know what you're doing here, but all my research points to this place. The girl who attacked my family was last seen conscious here, and something must have happened to her to turn her into a human puppet."

Dean and Sam glanced at each other. "Interesting choice of words," Dean said.

Claire tilted his head at him, still studying him. Then she decided he wasn't worth the effort, then shrugged. "I assume you two came to the same conclusion?" she asked. She was directing all her questions and comments to Sam, but she seemed more and more confused every time Dean answered.

Dean nodded. "We're investigating now."

"And that's why you've attacked poor Mrs. Diderickson?"

"Attacked is a strong word," Dean said. He could feel himself flushing; he didn't like the way she was looking at him like he was dangerous, not to be trusted.

She just rolled her eyes at him. She headed down the aisles, past all the toys and the evidence that Dean and Sam had stopped to examine, and went right for the puppets in the back of the toy store. Dean and Sam followed her, not sure whether they should try to talk her out of her investigation or just carry her out the doors without telling her why.

Finally, Claire stopped in front of the puppets and stared at them for a while. She had her hair braided, and she had actually done some makeup. She didn't look nearly as torn up as she had the day before, but Dean could see the signs. The slightly shaking hands. The bottom lip that wanted to tremble but just couldn't do it anymore. And she'd tried to hide the redness under her eyes, the puffiness. But Dean recognized the signs. She was hardly holding herself together, and the hunt was the thing driving her forward. So he didn't pick her up and carry her out the door; she needed to be part of this.

He just hoped he could communicate that to Sam.

"Claire," Dean said slowly.

She turned to him with wide eyes. It was the first time she had really, _really _looked at him, and it wasn't the way kids usually looked at him. That was weird.

"Claire, do you know something about these puppets that could help us?"

Claire turned back to the wooden puppets, then back to Dean, and she looked like she was going to say something, but she paused, stopped, looked back at the shelves. Slowly, carefully, she reached out and plucked two, tiny, puppets off the shelf.

Dean stared.

The one in her left hand looked just like Sam. The princess hair, the huge feet, the hunched shoulders. And the one in her right was a close approximation of Dean. Too many freckles, though. But they got the hair just right. Good-looking, too.

Claire held up the puppets to compare them with Dean and Sam, just to be sure, then immediately dropped them and held up an accusing finger. "You've seen him, haven't you?" she asked, her voice barely more than a whisper.

"Seen who?" Dean took a step forward, but Claire backed away from him.

"The puppetmaster," Claire whispered. Her eyes were brimming with the tears that, until then, she had been doing such an excellent job of holding back. "I thought he wasn't real, but . . . but with last night . . . and with you two . . . ." She shook her head. "How are you even still alive? I thought people who saw him died when the sun came up!"

Sam shook his head, then reached out for Claire's arm. He turned her around to face him, then asked, "Claire, do you know what's happening here? Why people are going missing?"

Dean recognized the panic on the girl's face. "It's just a myth," she insisted. "A legend. Something my parents told me to scare me into being a good girl."

Dean tried to get his eyes to do the Sammy Smile, but he still wasn't sure what muscles he was supposed to move to get it just right. "Claire," he said. "I need you to tell me everything you know about the puppetmaster."


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: This one's almost done. Got only a couple chapters left, and then you won't hear from me until after New Year's Day. But I've got plans for some new stuff, so I promise I'll be around for a long while.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or anything related to it.

...

" . . . and according to Claire, this thing takes your soul, sticks it temporarily in a wooden vessel—like a puppet—and then uses your body until the spell breaks the next morning," Sam finished.

The voice on the other line was quiet for a while before, at last, he heard, "And you two must have interrupted the spell before it was finished."

Sam nodded. "We figured our souls were already out when the controls caught on fire, and when they tried to go back, they got mixed up."

"This is bad, Sam," Ruby said.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. But think about it for a second, Ruby. This is the first real shot I've got at saving Dean."

"Sam—"

"I mean, if they come for me instead of him—"

"Sam!" Ruby shouted at him, and when Ruby shouted, he had learned it was a good idea to listen. She sighed heavily, then said, "Look, it's not that I don't want to help you save your brother. It's really not. But you've got to understand. Dean's still got an expiration date on his soul, not just his body."

"Maybe I can confuse the hell hounds long enough to—"

"To do what? Get Dean through the day?" Ruby laughed. "And even if you do manage to confuse them, you don't think every demon in town is gonna want a piece of your brother?"

"Maybe I can—"

"And what if it doesn't work? What if you're stuck in this body and Dean still dies in yours and it was all for nothing? You're telling me you want to stay in someone else's body, never comfortable in your own skin, trying to relearn all the muscle memory of hunting? You'll get yourself killed that way, Sam! And then what good are you?"

"Ruby—"

"You listen to me, Sam Winchester," Ruby continued. "You're learning how to control your powers; it's your best shot at saving your brother. And you're going to give all that raw power to your brother when you know he won't use it to save himself?"

"At least he knows better than to try," Sam muttered.

"Sam," Ruby said softly, slowly, "Sam, you've got to get back in your own skin. I can't . . . I won't be able to help you if you stay like this."

Sam opened his mouth to argue, but he heard shouting behind the door. It was Dean.

He didn't even bother to finish the conversation. He hung up and shoved his phone in his pocket with one hand while the other was unlocking the door to let himself in. He wanted to break down the door, but he just barely contained himself.

And then he was inside, and he almost wanted to laugh with relief. Dean wasn't being attacked; he was just having a nightmare.

Sam had never seen his brother have nightmares before. Not like this. Dean had tangled himself up in the sheets, was thrashing around, shouting, moaning. Sam frowned and rushed to his brother's side. "Dean," he said, trying to get his brother's attention. He tried to grab Dean's hand, but he was thrashing around too much. "Dean," he said, more urgently this time. He grabbed Dean's shoulders and tried to shake him awake.

Dean's eyes—well, Sam's eyes—opened wide, and Dean shouted, scrambling, trying to sit up but stuck in the tangled sheets. He was still somewhere between waking and sleeping, and the only thing he could process was the fact that he was stuck and couldn't move. Therefore, he'd gone straight into fighting mode.

"Dean," Sam said, holding his brother by the shoulders until Dean looked him in the eyes.

"Sammy," Dean gasped in a rasping voice. "Sammy, there's something inside me. There's something in here with me."

Sam tried not to panic, tried to think. "Do you know what it is?"

"I don't know," Dean said. He kept his jaw tightly clenched, but he had controlled his breathing now, and Sam could see the clarity behind eyes that used to be his own. "I don't know, Sammy. There's just something . . . in here. Something dark." He took a deep, calming breath. "I don't like it."

Sam helped Dean untangle himself. He tried not to notice that Dean was sweaty, that his longer hair was now matted down and tangled, wet and glistening. Dean wasn't comfortable in his own body, and now there was something else in there with him. Sam couldn't imagine what Dean was going through, and he was determined to fix this before they killed that puppet. If Dean was going to be in Sam's body . . . .

In Sam's . . . .

Sam sat down hard in the chair by the table. He reached up to run his hands through his hair and was surprised when that hair stopped before he expected it to; they were definitely hitting some speed bumps in the body-switching thing.

"Dean," Sam said slowly.

"What?"

"I know what it is."

"Great." Dean had finally untangled himself and sat at rapt attention. "How do we get it out of me? And even better, how do we kill it?"

"We don't."

Dean just stared at Sam for a while before he shook his head. "Look, Sammy, if this is one of those 'give 'em a chance' kicks you've been on since the psychic kids and—"

"I mean we can't kill it," Sam said. "That's me you're feeling inside you. Those are my powers."

Dean was silent for a long time. It was his processing face, and it took a while for him to get through that information. But when he had finally thought it through, rolled it around in his head to really get a handle on it, he snapped and made a face. "Really? That's what it feels like?"

Sam nodded.

"Dude, it feels all wrong." He shuddered. "Glad you gave up on those powers. I don't like it."

Sam tried not to let it show on his face, but he was disappointed by Dean's reaction. He had been trying to show Dean that there was more to his powers than just darkness and evil, that maybe he could do good with them, but Dean always looked at him like a freak, a mess he had to clean up after. And even now, when he could access Sam's powers himself, Dean thought they were wrong, something to be avoided.

Sam wished he had Dean's clarity, his sense of the world in black and white.

Dean shivered some more, then hoped in the shower to clean off all the sweat real quick before they met up with Claire.

They'd argued about that one a lot, too. Dean trusted Claire to get information and to handle herself as a temporary member of their team, and he got along with her much better now that she understood what had happened to the two of them, but he still insisted that she wasn't allowed to be around for the actual hunting part.

But Sam figured she could stick around. She hadn't been so bad helping him out with some research. (Turns out the best way to get rid of that thing was the burn the controls to make sure it couldn't steal any more souls, then cut him up and burn the pieces while he didn't have a weapon.) And she knew her way around the town.

Besides, Sam was worried about that puppet. It seemed to have it out for him and his brother, but it didn't go for people from the town. He figured Claire was safe, and he wanted someone around to make sure their souls stayed in their bodies—whether in the right ones or the wrong ones, Sam wasn't so concerned just so long as they didn't end up in those little wooden puppets.

Claire knocked on their door just after Dean finished showering and only had his pants on—he hadn't yet picked out a shirt that he liked. His fashion sense was just different enough from Sam's that he was taking a long time and being picky (Sam called him a girl, and Dean had countered that if Sam didn't dress like a girl maybe Dean wouldn't have to act like one. They shared clothes all the time, but that was different. Dean had favorite shirts of Sam's that fit him really well; he was trying to dress for a completely different body).

When Sam opened the door, Dean's eyes widened, and he threw on the nearest shirt. He wasn't usually careful about modesty, but being around kids brought out the weirdest tendencies in Sam's big brother.

"Claire?" Dean asked. He stumbled over a bit. He was still getting used to being taller.

"Hey," Claire said. She held up several boxes of matches, some cigarette lighters, and a bag full of what smelled like gasoline. "I figured y'all hadn't had time to get the supplies y'all needed, what with being up half the night and all."

Dean finally got his shirt on. "I appreciate the effort, but you can't—"

Claire waved her hand at him and rolled her eyes. "Yeah right. Like you're keeping me out of the case that killed my entire family." At that, Sam saw the strength leave her expression for just one, fleeting second. But she pulled herself back together and shot Dean a look that clearly said "Eat dirt."

"Like I'm taking a kid into danger," Dean countered.

Sam held up a hand. He was used to this, to being the one to broker the peace. It was just weird to be doing it as Dean, because he still hadn't mastered The Look yet with these facial features. He sighed and turned to Claire. "Thanks for coming," he said. "We appreciate it." Then, he turned to Dean. "And of course we can have her along. This thing doesn't want locals, so she should be totally safe."

"And besides, I've got more than enough matches to go around," Claire said. And she was right; she'd brought enough to take down the puppet thing and a half dozen changelings.

Dean could tell he was outnumbered in this argument, so he sighed. But he held up one hand—a hand that looked much bigger now that he was the short one—and pointed at them both. "Okay, but on _one _condition," he said. His voice got deep and dangerous, and Sam didn't even know his voice was capable of doing that.

Claire just nodded at him.

"You have to let us do the fighting," he said. "I'm serious. If that thing sees you as a threat, it might come after you."

"Right. I'm just backup, and I'll leave the hunting to the professionals," Claire said, but she said it so deadpan, so casually, that Sam was quite sure she didn't mean a word of it.

Dean could tell she was just saying that to please him, and he narrowed his eyes, but there wasn't much more he could do when she had already made up her mind. So, he just continued with his demands. "And if you think we're about to go puppet on you, if you think we're becoming mindless zombies, you drop everything and _run_," he said.

"Don't need to tell me twice," Claire said. This time, Sam could tell she meant it. He could see the darkness behind her eyes, the darkness of losing someone and watching it happen. She wasn't keen to repeat the experience.

"Good," Dean said. He reached into Sam's bag and pulled out his favorite flashlight. "Then let's get going. I'd like to get settled before the sun goes down so we can catch this thing on our turf."


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or any such related rights.

...

Dean crouched down around the corner of the aisle. He could see the puppet from this vantage point, but it hadn't moved yet.

They had cleared the toy store. The sheriff wasn't too pleased about it, and they'd argued for a while about proper jurisdiction and what they were actually allowed to do considering how real their badges were. But eventually, the guy caved, if only because they were still alive and that had never happened before to anyone who investigated this thing.

The light was already flickering when the first clouds in the sky started to turn orange. Dean could usually feel his whole body tensing at this point, and Sam's body was doing a good job of it all on its own, but it was a little less so. A little less tense, a little more relaxed. Dean actually had to think about it when he settled in for a fight; it wasn't second-nature to Sam.

No wonder the kid had tried to get out of the life.

Claire was standing beside him. They had given her an entire book of matches just to keep her safe, and she was breathing way too loud.

"You'll be okay," he said.

"I know."

"No, you don't. But I'm telling you: you're tough, and you can leave all the heavy lifting to me and Sam. We're not going to let anything happen to you."

Claire nodded. She looked out the window to see the sun setting. "It's weird," she said. "You spend your whole life thinking that things like this don't exist, that it's all just fairy tales and ghost stories and lies that parents tell their kids and that you tell around the campfire."

"Sorry you had to find out like this," Dean said.

Claire shook her head. "I'm not sorry. I just wish I'd known about it sooner. Maybe I would have been able to help my parents, to save my family if I'd known how to fight it."

"Don't," Dean said. He turned his full attention to her; he figured they still had a couple minutes left before the puppet came to life, and besides, Sam had an eye on it, too. This was more important. "Don't go blaming yourself," he said. "You can't start thinking like that. If you go over all the what ifs and the possibilities, you're never going to stop."

Claire looked down at her hands. They were shaking. But then she looked back up at Dean. "Who did you lose?"

Dean wasn't surprised by the question. Claire was a lot more astute than they had originally given her credit for being. "My mother," he said quietly, softly. He didn't usually talk about it, but there were a select few people who could understand, who knew exactly what he was talking about. "I saved Sam, but my mom was already dead. We didn't know about monsters back then, and they got my mom." He looked down at the floor. "My house burned down, but I saved Sam."

"At least you saved someone," she whispered.

He draped one of Sam's incredibly long arms over this girl and tried to use Sammy's puppy eyes on her. "Don't think like that. You kept yourself safe, and that's better than a lot of people can do."

Claire nodded. She gripped the matchbook even tighter. "When this is all over," she said, "do you think you could teach me other things? About monsters?"

Dean frowned. "No."

"But how can I fight off things like that if I don't—"

"You'll be fine," Dean said. "Trust me. You don't want in this life."

Claire opened her mouth like she was about to argue with him, but she closed it when she saw the puppets.

All of them. They were all moving.

"You have _got _to be kidding me," Dean said. He lit the match carefully, waiting for the right moment to light up the alcohol that lined the floor.

He heard Sam's surprised shout and figured that was a good time.

The puppets were good at swinging from the aisles and the shelves. The toys around them fell off, and Dean could swear he heard a sound like laughter—children's laughter.

And then there was a little, freckled face in Dean's face, and he ripped the Dean-puppet off. That little guy kept clinging and fighting and biting and scratching, but Dean didn't know if he could kill the thing without it doing something to him and Sam, so he just held it at arm's length.

But the puppets were a brilliant distraction technique. By the time Dean got his mini counterpart off, the pinstriped puppet was gone.

"You got eyes?" Dean asked Claire.

She shook her head. "Sorry. I was trying to help you with the other puppets."

"I appreciate the effort," Dean said, "but I really need you to focus." He pointed up at the shelf tops. "You see anything that look like a yellow glow, you shout for me. That's the puppet working its mojo, and I don't want to end up dead before my time."

Claire nodded. She watched the tops of the shelves while Dean watched the aisles, and Sam made his way over through the fires and puppets to watch his back.

Sure enough, the puppet—apparently realizing that he wasn't going to get to the three of them without them seeing—stepped around the end of the aisle way down at the other side of the store, just far enough that they could see him but not get to him.

Dean felt the familiar pulling sensation in the pit of his stomach, and the puppet's control was glowing yellow. He charged, his lighter and brandy held like a battle standard, but about halfway down the aisle, he collapsed, so he threw both of his weapons and hoped that Sam had better luck. (He could see his brother charging in front of him.)

And then something in the back of his mind clicked. He didn't know what it was, but it was like some kind of dark film went over his entire head. He saw his brother go down, watched the yellow magic enter the puppet's control, but he was still conscious.

And he recognized the darkness running through him now that he stopped to think about it. Sam's powers.

Dean paused. He hadn't thought it would come to this. He had intended to leave those things untouched; he didn't know what using them would do to Sam's body when he presented it back to his brother. But he had seen Sam go down, and something happened. He didn't know what it was. But he could feel some kind of strength in the back of his mind, a dark force more powerful than the puppet, fighting back against the spell.

He didn't want to use these powers, though. They were dangerous, and they were going to turn his Sammy into something that he didn't want Sammy to be. And if he used them, even to save Sam, what was the guarantee that Sam would be the same when he came back?

Dean had been so proud of Sam, avoiding his powers. And he didn't want his brother to fall back into bad habits just because Dean was too weak to resist the temptation.

But he didn't need to make the decision. He heard a battle cry from behind him. The puppet hadn't been paying attention to Claire because she wasn't an outsider. She wasn't a target. But she was dangerous all the same, and the puppet realized it too late, because he was pulling back now. The yellow glow stopped, and the haze in the back of Dean's mind was slowly retreating now that the threat was over.

"Weird," Dean said. "Sam's never been able to do that before."

He wasn't sure what that meant. Did that mean the darkness in Sam liked Dean's soul better and could work with him better? That was probably what it was. Sam had always been the better brother, the saint. The guy felt guilty about everything. Dean, well, he wasn't like Sam. He wasn't as good. So yeah, that was a distinct possibility.

Or maybe Sam hadn't really stopped using his powers.

Dean pushed that thought aside. He would ask Sam about that once they were back in their own bodies and this whole mess was over.

He motioned to Claire that she should take that side of the toy store, and he followed her. He kept an eye out for the puppet, but he also kept an eye out for her. Now that the puppet realized she was a threat, he might try to do something to her, too.

They didn't see that little menace for a while, and Dean thought maybe they were in the clear when the unthinkable happened.

Slowly, groaning, Dean's body rose. But Sam wasn't inside it anymore. No one was inside it anymore.

Dean frowned. He signaled to Claire to keep going. "I've got this one," he said. "You go set that little toad on fire."

Claire nodded, and Dean faced himself. He'd done this before. Dopplegangers, dreamlands, it was all the same. At least this thing wasn't going to try to talk him to death.

And there were some real advantages. Sam's body was much bigger than Dean's, and Sam had only brought matches and alcohol, no knives or guns.

Dean, on the other hand, was always packing. He was just trying to figure out where to shoot his body so he could recover. (And where it would hurt the least, just in case Sammy ended up back in that body again temporarily.)

Dean could feel calloused hands pressed up against his throat, but there was no one to reason with. This thing was strong; Dean knew his own strength, and this was not something he could have done in his own body. He could already feel the breath leaving him, and Dean had barely had time to react, to realize he was being attacked. This thing was fast.

But he grabbed the empty body and flipped it over his head. His body slammed on the ground, and Dean knelt down on top of it, pressing its chest into the floor. He pulled out his pistol. Man, this was gonna sting when he got back inside his body.

_Bam_. He felt a foot in the small of his back. Yeah, apparently this thing was also way more flexible than Dean had accounted for. Dean knew he definitely couldn't do that with his legs and hips. When he got back in there, he was going to be sore, too.

He heard Claire shout, then scream, but he was a bit occupied, so he couldn't go to help her. But she was a strong kid, and she could probably handle herself. This thing didn't take the souls of the people in the town, for whatever reason, but it could send its minions after her.

He threw the empty body into the shelves with so much force that it knocked three of them into each other. He winced. That was gonna hurt, too. Good thing _he_ was gonna get back in there and not Sammy.

While his empty body was temporarily incapacitated, he rushed around the corner. The puppet had its arms around Claire's chest, and she had dropped her matchbook. He dived, she rolled, and somehow they both had hold of the matchbook.

He let go of it when he saw the look in her eyes, saw that she already had a match to light. He saw the yellow light around the controls and felt the familiar buzzing in the back of his head. But then, when Claire lit up the controls, the buzzing was a full-on hurricane, and he blacked out.


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: Okay, this will be the last you hear of me in the year 2012. I will be returning in 2013 with a new project. (It's my first ever attempt at Superwho, so this could either be fantastic or it could fail epicly.)

Disclaimer: As usual, I don't own any of the rights related to Supernatural. Or, for this chapter, Styx. Which is sad.

...

Sam woke up because Claire was shaking him.

"What happened?" he muttered. When he sat up, his head still hurt, but not nearly as much as it had when he was in Dean's body. He could practically taste his powers trying to fight their way to the surface and could not help wondering just how far Dean had gone to get them back in their right places.

"I set the puppet on fire," Claire said with a proud smile. She indicated the remnants of what must have been a devastating fire; Sam could see the foam from a fire extinguisher everywhere. Claire really wasn't half bad at this.

"Nicely done," Sam said. He pulled himself to his feet and was surprised to see that Claire was staring at him intently. "What?"

"Are y'all back in your proper places, or do y'all have more research to do?"

Sam looked down at himself, brought his hands up to feel his hair. Yep, it was longer, though not as conditioned anymore, because Dean just couldn't bring himself to do that. "I think so," he said.

Claire glanced around the aisle at the still-unconscious Dean. "Good." She pulled him to the back of the store and sat down in front of him with a look that clearly said she meant business. "Listen," she said, and the tone she took with him was enough to stop anyone in their tracks. "I don't know if you realize this, but there's something inside you. It kept your brother on his feet when he was in there, but it ain't good. Even I could see that, and I ain't magic or nothing."

Sam sighed. That was exactly what he needed—one more person telling him what he could and couldn't do. But it was hard to argue with wide, earnest eyes, so he just shrugged. "Yeah. I know. I've been that way since I was a baby."

Her eyes softened just the slightest bit when he said that, like she suddenly understood that she had stepped into something that had a lot more history than she was ready to deal with. But then she straightened up anyway. "And another thing," she said. "I already talked to your brother about this, and he turned me down, but—"

"No."

"You ain't even heard what I have to say!"

"The answer's still no," Sam said. He could already tell what it was that Claire wanted. He had seen the same look on Jo's face before, and he's seen that look on Dean's face his entire life. It was the excitement, the draw of the hunt, and it had her, and it wasn't about to let go. "You've got your entire life ahead of me, and trust me when I say that you don't want to get involved. It's hard to get out of this life once you're in it."

"What if I don't want out of it?" Claire countered.

"Trust me. You will."

"Trust me. I won't," Claire said. "I mean, look at what you do! You get to save people, be heroes. You're part of a world that most people can't even dream about!"

"And it's terrifying, and you lose everyone you love."

"You haven't lost Dean," Claire pointed out.

Sam frowned and looked away.

Claire leaned forward and put her hand on Sam's shoulder. "You haven't, have you?"

Sam just shrugged her off, but thankfully, Dean was starting to wake up now, and he groaned with terrible pain from being thrown around so much. "Aw man," Dean said from across the store. "I feel like I been run over by a truck."

Claire laughed. "You should go to your brother," she said.

"Thanks," Sam said. He stood up and offered Claire a hand up before he rushed to Dean's side.

Dean looked pretty awful—and the worst part was he'd only done this to himself, literally. He had been the one to throw his own body around. He groaned as he wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, but when Sam tried to offer him a hand up, he just pushed him away, like usual. "Sammy," he moaned. "Sammy, I'm sorry."

There were a hundred things that Dean could be blaming himself for—things he could be apologizing for.

"I'm sorry," Dean said again. He leaned back against the fallen racks to try and pull himself together. "I couldn't control it like you could. I let it get in my head before I realized it was happening."

Oh. Sam understood now. He was talking about Sam's powers. Of course he was. That was what was always important. Not that Dean was dying, not that he was going to lose his soul to eternal torment. No, what was important was keeping Sam "pure" and clean and whatever else Dean wanted to call it. Sam frowned. He knew he had tasted the afterimages of his powers being used, but what had Dean done?

Dean took Sam's silence to mean that Sam was disappointed in him, which of course was not true, but that was how Dean usually took things. He sighed and leaned back even further, closing his eyes and rubbing the bridge of his nose. Finally, he said. "I'll make it up to you, Sam. I don't know how, but I will. I wish I was strong enough to keep it back, but there was this yellow light and then my whole head hurt and—"

"Dean." Sam held up his hand to stop his brother's explanation. Then, a little more quietly and with a small smile, he said, "Dean, I couldn't control it when I first felt my powers, so I wouldn't expect you to be able to, either. It's not your fault."

"I should have—"

"Shut up." Sam offered a hand to help his brother up, and this time, Dean took it. He pulled Dean to his feet, then looked around. "Where's Claire?"

"Wasn't she with me—you—whoever?" Dean asked. He rubbed his head. This whole switching bodies thing was really confusing.

"She was, and she was talking about wanting to learn more about . . . ." He trailed off when he realized where Claire must have run off to.

Dean realized it at the same time, and they both went busting out of the front doors. But Claire had already pulled out of the driveway in her little truck.

Dean swore and kicked the curb, while Sam was not sure whether to grin after her or humor Dean's anxiety attack. "I guess it's time to tell that old lady what happened to her shop," Sam said. He figured he should say something to keep Dean from jumping in the Impala and tailing the poor girl until one or both of them ran out of gas.

"Or we could just jump ship and get outta town before she wakes up," Dean said.

Sam nodded. He liked that option.

Dean was a little slower getting into the Impala, not only because he was hurting and sore but because he was still trying to get used to his old body. Sam was the same way; he was still struggling to remember to duck when he got in the car when he had finally gotten used to getting in normally. And Dean was ducking and scrunching like he was still four inches taller.

They drove fast out of that town and didn't stop until they hit a gas station that was far enough out of town that they could safely assume that no one was around to identify them.

"I'm gonna give that sheriff a call," Dean said. He handed the pump over to Sam—which he was doing more often, the closer they got to the end of his year. He said it was mostly to give Sam the experience he needed, but Sam figured he was also trying to distance himself from his life so it would be easier when it was time to go.

"What for?"

"Figure he did us a solid, and I hate leaving him in the lurch when he could've turned us over to the FBI."

"Fair enough."

So Sam found himself filling the car while Dean ducked around the corner, his fingers in the ear that wasn't pressed to his cell phone. Sam only heard the beginning of the conversation: "Hey, sheriff, listen. We found the thing that's been messing up your town, but there's a downside . . . ."

Sam frowned. He could feel his cell phone vibrating, probably Ruby calling to check in on him. He glanced around the corner, but Dean was facing him, keeping an eye on his little brother, as always. He couldn't talk to Ruby right then. Dean already hated her, and now he was blaming himself for "inflaming" the psychic powers problem. This was not the time to complicate things with Dean.

Sam waited in the car for Dean to get back and tried to smile his best reassuring smile. "What'd he say?"

"He was glad we got rid of the puppet, but he couldn't believe we torched half the toy shop to do it."

"He want to press charges?'

"Naw. I think he figures it's worth saving the lives in his town," Dean said with a shrug. "How ya' holding up, Sammy?"

"It's weird having to duck everywhere again," Sam said. "But it's nice being back in my own body."

"Is it?" Dean looked at him hard.

"Dean . . . ."

"No, really," Dean said. "I've been inside there, Sam. And it doesn't feel good. Are you really doing okay?"

"I'm fine," Sam said. He stared straight ahead. He hated that he had to have this conversation with his brother _every time _he even mentioned the psychic thing. Was it really so wrong that Sam had something inside him if he had a handle on it?

Dean pursed his lips. "Yeah. Of course you are."

Sam didn't say anything, and Dean wasn't going to elaborate, so he turned on the radio. It was Styx, "Fooling Yourself," and Dean leaned back. He wasn't going to change it.

"And you're fooling yourself if you don't believe it.

You're kidding yourself if you don't believe it.

How can you be such an angry young man

When your future looks quite bright to me?

How can there be such a sinister plan

That could hide such a lamb, such a caring young man?"


End file.
